Organizational Behaviour
26th Nov 2010
Coursework on the module, ‘MANAGING PEOPLE’
Course Code: MAN4230M
UB Number:
I certify that this assignment is the result of my own work and does
not exceed the word count noted below.
Number of words: 1500
(Excluding references/tables/figures and title page)
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A critical analysis of leadership in an organization:
With reference to Accenture
Introduction:
1. Leadership is crucial for the success of an organisation. Leadership can be
found at different levels in the organisation other than executive level (Buchanan and
Huczynski 2010). Walt Disney once said: “You can dream, create, design and build
the most wonderful place in the world... but it requires people to make the dream a
reality” (Hamzah and Zairi 1997). People are the most important asset of any
organisation; driving, influencing and handling individuals of an organisation towards
a common goal is a challenging and interesting job in the current increasingly
competitive world. This review focuses on team management issue that occurred
among management, team leader and team members of Accenture. Accenture is a
Comment [BU1]: BROAD ISSUE
global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company.
This review explores situational leadership, team leadership model and finds
apt model to Accenture‟s context. This review stresses the importance of individual
traits, motivation and also suggests a solution to leaders/managers on leading teams
Comment [BU2]: SPECIFIC TOPIC ?
to achieve best results.
Real life problem:
Value addition to the client by delivering efficient (quality & quick) output was
the focus in the project to gain confidence of the new client that Accenture has
acquired and thus acquiring more business from the client. Team leader has to
achieve efficient and effective results from the team members; however team
members are not motivated towards this goal as they would get their salary
irrespective of their performance. There was no significant difference in the salary
structure and bonus for a high and a medium performer and not many employees
get high performance rating in the project. This clearly shows the criticality of a team
leader in Accenture who handles teams to meet management expectations with
stringent deadlines. Organisational groups or work teams leadership has become
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Comment [BU3]: ORG. PROBLEM
one of the most popular and rapidly growing areas of leadership theory and research
(Northhouse 2010).
Implications:
When targets are high and no incentives are being offered for such
achievement employees lose focus, motivation, interest and can lead to many
problems in the team. This is what exactly happened in Accenture‟s project. Few
team members were performing at bare minimum level knowing the fact that there
would not be any monetary benefits for high performance. This has shifted burden to
other team members in the team resulting stress on these individuals. As a result
conflicts among team members cropped up and the performance levels of all the
employees dropped down significantly and most importantly employee attrition had
started. Project started with an aim of acquiring new business from the client by
gaining confidence in the form of delivering efficient output but ended up closely
Comment [BU4]: PROBLEM
DESCRIPTION / DETAIL
towards loosing the client as the project deadlines were continuously missed.
Leadership training and its relevance:
Each individual in a team is unique and factors that influence the behaviour of an
individual can be many, few of them are listed below.

Experience Level

Behaviour/attitude

Personal Background

Technical skills etc.
As a result team leader needs to be flexible enough to handle each individual
accordingly. Northhouse (2010 p.92) in his book refers to the work of Blanchard et al
(1985) states that, four different leadership styles that can be chosen based on the
experience of the team members as shown in figure 1. We can observe that as the
knowledge and experience of the team increases, leader should shift his focus from
directive behaviour to coaching followed by supportive and eventually allow the
individual to act independently. As part of leadership excellence training program all
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Comment [BU5]: FIRST MODEL
team leaders in the project have received situational leadership training in
Comment [BU6]: MODEL ALREADY
IN PRACTICE
Accenture.
Team leaders in the project focussed on experience aspect of the team
members and ignored all other aspects of an individual; and also team was not
looked as a whole rather the focus was much on individual basis. There were hardly
any opportunities for the team members to meet and share their experiences and
build relationships with other team members or other teams in the same project; due
Comment [BU7]: PRACTICE
CRITIQUING THEORY
to lack of such environment e.g. frequent knowledge sharing sessions, team outings,
and fun activities etc. Team co-ordination consistently lacked and this directly
affected performance of each team member in the project. Situational leadership is
helpful in handling individuals but this theory ignores team concept and all other
aspects of individual except experience. In organizations where team work is pivotal
to reach strict deadlines, situational leadership in itself is inadequate to handle the
team; as this theory focuses on selecting the leadership style as per the individual‟s
experience alone. Also, several authors do criticize this approach due to its
ambiguity in defining development levels of subordinates, its credibility is questioned
Comment [BU8]: OTHER
THEORISTS (ONLY ONE ?)
CRITIQUING MODEL
as only few research studies have been conducted etc. (Northhouse 2010).
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Figure 1:
(Source: The KenBlanchard Companies 2010).
Choosing appropriate Leadership Model:
In organisations like Accenture where team co-ordination is the paramount,
team leaders and management need to focus on team building activities regularly, to
build positive relationships among team members and work towards the
organizational goal. Project members hardly get such opportunities to interact with
all the team members as the management is keen in task accomplishment ignoring
all others that contribute indirectly to the task in hand. In order for the project to be
successful project has to adopt a leadership style that covers all aspects of a team
such as coaching, managing conflicts among the team members, providing an
environment to share information, training required to accomplish the tasks etc. All
aspects discussed for the team success are covered in Team leadership model. This
model presents leaders with a detailed road map to diagnose team problems and
appropriate action to correct identified problems.
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Comment [BU9]: RATIONALE FOR
AN ALTERNATIVE MODEL
This model (See Figure 2) is based on functional leadership claim that
leader‟s job is to monitor and take necessary action to ensure team‟s effectiveness
(Northhouse 2010).
Figure 2:
Leadership Decisions
Monitor or Take Action
Task or Relational
Internal or External
Internal Leadership Actions
Task
External Leadership Actions
Relational
Environmental
Goal Focusing
Coaching
Networking
Structuring for Results
Collaborating
Advocating
Facilitating Decisions
Managing Conflict
Negotiating Support
Training
Building
Commitment
Buffering
Maintaining Standards
Assessing
Satisfying Needs
Sharing Information
Modeling Principles
Team Effectiveness
Performance
Development
(Source: Northhouse 2010)
Other Aspects worth considering:
Team leaders, Managers in the project were completely blinded by
deliverables and deadlines. This made management to overlook basic roles of
management such as understanding individuals, knowing interests of individuals etc.
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Hogan (1991), as summarised by Clegg and Hardy (1999 p.153) states that
individuals can be characterized by observing dispositional qualities which can be
used for the employee development and organizational effectiveness. Each
individual can be classified into one of the 30 traits under 5 headings identified by
Comment [BU10]: FURTHER
THEORETICAL IDEAS OF
RELEVANCE TO ORG.
Costa and McCrae as depicted in Table 1 (Buchanan and Huczynski).
Table 1:
High
Low
Explorer (O+)
Openness
Preserver (O-)
Creative, open-minded,
rigidity of beliefs & range of interests
not
receptive to new idea,
Intellectual
narrow-minded
Focussed (C+)
Conscientiousness
Flexible (C-)
Organized, self-disciplined,
desire to impose order and precision
disorganized, frivolous,
Achievement-oriented
irresponsible
Extravert (E+)
Extroversion
Introvert (E-)
Sociable, talkative, assertive
level of comfort with relationships
sociable, irritable,
Adapter (A+)
less
uncooperative
Agreeableness
Challenger (A-)
Good-natured,
compliant the ability to get along with others
quarrelsome, irritable, Sympathetic
uncooperative
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Reactive (R+)
Neuroticism
resilient (N-)
Anxious, depressed,
tendency to maintain a balanced emotional state
calm, contented, self-conscious
self-assured
High
Low
(Source: Buchanan and Huczynski)
Six traits (fantasy, aesthetics, feelings, actions, ideas, values) relating to
openness vary from „explorer‟ at one extreme to „preserver‟ at the other. Explorer
(O+) traits are useful for purely creative sectors such as entrepreneurs, architects,
artists etc. Preserver (O-) traits are useful for project managers, stage performers
etc. Those in the middle are named „moderates‟ who are interested in novelty when
there is a requirement but not for too long (Buchanan and Huczynski). In the same
way traits related to other 4 headings are useful in various fields.
It is time consuming to understand or judge individuals and deal accordingly;
another problem here is employee turnover. By the time team leaders understand an
employee; he/she might start looking for other opportunities or might have already
filed resignation. This is the major problem in any IT industry in India and Accenture
is no exception to this. Key point here is no attempt was being made by the team
Comment [BU11]: PRACTICAL
ISSUES WITH IMPLEMENTING
RELEVANT THEORY
leaders or management to understand employees and their interests.
Understanding personality traits and realising that each individual falls in one
of these categories helps leaders to delegate jobs accordingly. This inculcates
intrinsic motivation to employees thus, maximising team‟s performance. Employees
Comment [BU12]: NONETHELESS,
FURTHER RATIONALE FOR
USEFULNESS OF ALTERNATIVE,
THEORETICAL APPROACH
with intrinsic motivation are high performers (Deci et al 2001).
Resolution:
Training on leadership and other aspects relevant to the team leaders is the
pivotal in Accenture to handle teams efficiently and effectively. Trainings are
conducted on leadership but are not abreast and training programs need to
incorporate the latest and useful models/styles such as team leadership model,
charismatic and transformational. Leadership styles like charismatic and
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transformational can bring a positive impact to the organisation by following them
(Yukl, 2002). In addition leadership team needs to be aware of personality traits and
Hertzberg‟s motivation theory, which stresses hygiene factors and motivators in the
work environment (Chell 1988). If the management was aware of the existence of
team leadership model and had implemented, this situation would not have occurred
in Accenture as this is the apt model to the current situation. As a short term solution
team leaders can concentrate on relationship building (team leadership model) to
Comment [BU13]: AUTHOR‟S
POSITION = RECOMMENDATIONS
BASED ON PRECEDING ARGUMENT
bring the situation under control and then can concentrate on all other aspects of the
team leadership model. From Accenture point of view training programs need to be
abreast and train the leadership teams as per the project requirement. Though the
solution incurs costs, it is worth spending in training rather than losing or delivering
inferior output to the client, which is disastrous to the company in many aspects.
Conclusion:
Team performance issues exist in almost every company but the problem in
Accenture has become worse due to the leadership team‟s ignorance to handle the
Comment [BU14]: VALUE OF
THEORY FOR PRACTICE
situation. This review highlighted the importance of team leadership in a global
organisation, and found training system to be irrelevant to real life situation. This
review found team leadership model as the apt model to resolve organisation‟s
existing problems, explored relevance of individual traits and factors that affect
employee motivation; which helps leadership team to manage teams effectively.
Comment [BU15]: SUMMARY OF
MAJOR POINTS COVERED
Finally this review suggested a solution to the leadership and organisation.
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References:
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Chell, E. (1988). The psychology of behavior in organizations, 1st edition. London: The Macmillan
Press Ltd.
Clegg, R. and Hardy, C. (1999). Studying Organization 1st edition. London: Sage publications.
Deci, E. et al (2001). ‘Extrinsic rewards and intrinsic motivation in education: Reconsidered
once again’. Review of Educational Research, Vol. 71, pp. 1-27.
Hamzah, A., and Zairi, M. (1997). ‘Best practice in people Management’, Management
Development Review. Vol. 10, No. 4/5, pp. 17*9–182.
Huczynski, A. and Buchman, A. (2010). Organizational Behaviour, 7th edition. Harlow: Pearson
Education.
Northhouse, G. (2010). Leadership, 5th edition. California: Sage Publications.
Yukl, G. (2002). Leadership in organizations, 5th edition. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc.
The Ken Blanchard Companies (2000).Situational Leadership II Teaching Others. Escondido CA:
The Ken Blanchard Companies. Available at:
http://kenblanchard.net/files/pdf/SLII_Teach_Others.pdf [Accessed 23 Oct 2010].
Bibliography:
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Blackler, F., and Shimmin, S. (1984). Applying psychology in organizations, 1st edition. London:
Methun & Co. Ltd.
Blanchard, H. and Johnson, S. (1983). The one minute manager. New York: Berkeley Publishing
Group.
Duck, S. (1992). Human Relationships, 2nd edition. London: Sage publication.
Smith, I. (2008). ‘People management – be bold!’, Library Management Vol. 29 No. 1/2, pp. 1828.
Vigoda-Gadot, E. (2007). ‘Leadership style, organizational politics and employees
performance’. Leadership Style. Vol. 36 No. 5, pp. 661-683.
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